


Skin Diver

by Waldo



Category: Torchwood
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, Hypothermia, M/M, Swimming
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-07-02
Updated: 2008-07-02
Packaged: 2017-10-05 01:01:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,521
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/36034
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Waldo/pseuds/Waldo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jack wasn't counting on it being *in* the channel, but that's okay, Ianto's good at improvising.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Skin Diver

**Author's Note:**

>   Written for [](http://www.livejournal.com/users/horizonssing/profile)[**horizonssing**](http://www.livejournal.com/users/horizonssing/) [Day Two Challenge](http://community.livejournal.com/horizonssing/1831.html#cutid1).  It's a photo challenge.  You can see the photo at the Day Two link.

"Ianto!" Jack bellowed from his office.  "Ianto, I need you now."

"Oy, Jack, a little subtlety would kill you?" Gwen chipped in from her computer.

"Funny," Jack replied curtly before bellowing again.  "Ianto!"

Before the echo could die, Ianto was in Jack's doorway handing him a cup of coffee.  "I can't make it brew faster just because you get louder, Jack."

Jack looked up from the coffee to Ianto.  "Oh, no… I wasn't… I mean, thanks, but that's not what I needed you for."

Ianto just canted his head and waited for Jack to continue.

"There was a rift spike up over Flatholm.  Come with me to chase it down?"

"What's out there?  Certainly not a weevil?"  Ianto leaned against the doorjamb.

"Looks like a piece of low-level tech.  But given that we're already hiding something out there, I'd just as soon it not come up on someone else's radar before we can recover it.  It's on the other side of the island from the facility, so we're going to have a bit of a hike.  You might want to put on jeans."  Jack retrieved his pistol from his desk and made a show of checking the chambers.

"Expecting trouble?" Ianto asked as he straightened up.

"Nah, just want to be ready for anything.  Go.  Change.  We leave in fifteen minutes.  I'll tell Gwen she's holding down the fort for the afternoon."  Jack made shooing motions with his hands and Ianto headed off to shed his suit.

*~*~*~*~*~*

An hour later they were picking their way across the brush of Flatholm Island.  Jack had Tosh's palm pilot and they were tracking a signal that grew steadily stronger. 

"Another fifty meters or so," Jack said and then stopped abruptly.  "Or… not…"

"You found it?" Ianto said, stopping a few steps ahead of Jack and looking for anything other than birds or grass.

"Um, not exactly.  This says that it's about fifty meters ahead of us and about six meters down."  Jack gestured with his head.  The island effectively ended thirty yards in front of them.

"It's in the channel," Ianto surmised.

Jack shook the small computer as if he could get it to apologize for being slightly inaccurate or it would pony up some more agreeable data.

Ianto shaded his eyes with one hand, inspecting the shoreline and the ocean.  "Alright then," he said decisively before continuing to walk.  He didn't look back to see if Jack was following him or not.  He suspected that if he did, he'd lose his nerve.

Ianto moved purposefully to the edge of the land, and carefully climbed down the five or so feet of rocks and sand, the ledge where storms had eroded away the higher land over time.  Once down he spotted a small wooden boat dock that projected about five feet into the water.

He stood on the edge of it looking out before he finally turned back to Jack.  "How far from here?" he asked.

"Fifteenish meters out, five or six meters down.  We're going to need to get some equipment," Jack sighed, clearly annoyed at having lost half a day and not being able to retrieve the object.

"No we don't," Ianto said succinctly before pulling off his t-shirt and kicking off his trainers.

"What are you doing?" Jack asked quietly.  He was all for a romp in the great outdoors, but he had a feeling that wasn't exactly what Ianto had in mind.

"Retrieving the technology," Ianto said as he shoved his jeans down and pulled his socks off with them.

Before Jack could say anything else, Ianto ran down the dock and dove into the ocean.

Jack found himself holding his own breath as he waited for Ianto to surface, not exhaling until Ianto popped back up a half dozen meters from where he'd gone in, lazily stroking his way further out.  Jack watched as he turned back and faced the shore.

"Here?" Ianto shouted back.

Jack checked the hand-held.  "About three more meters out!" he shouted.

Ianto back-stroked a little further until Jack yelled, "Right there!  It's about six inches and cubical!" he hollered, realizing that neither of them had thought to discuss what it was exactly that Ianto was looking for.  He suspected he didn't need to explain that it should have half a dozen flashing lights on it.

Again, Jack held his breath as Ianto flipped over, his feet coming up as his head went down.  A few seconds later, he surfaced, shaking his head before going back down again.  Ianto dove and resurfaced half a dozen times, while Jack wondered exactly how cold the water was and if Ianto was starting to fatigue. 

When he surfaced the next time he was waving a small gold box with blinking lights.  Jack shook his head as Ianto swam back to shore.  Jack ran to the edge of the dock and took the box from Ianto, setting it on the wooden planks while he hauled Ianto up onto dry land.  "You are a lunatic," Jack told him as he pulled off his greatcoat and wrapped it around Ianto's shoulders.

"It's July.  It's warm out, what's wrong with a little swim?" Ianto asked, even though he knew his chattering teeth were giving away the exact problem.

"Yes, the air is a fabulous twenty-four degrees.  It's - what? - &lt;I&gt;ten&lt;/I&gt; degrees in that water?"  He began vigorously rubbing Ianto's arms through the wool of his coat.

"Speaking of which, it's twenty-four degrees out, why are you wearing your coat?"  He didn't, however, try to give it back.

"Apparently in case some idiot decided it would be a good day for a swim."  Jack shook his head.  "Take your shorts off, they're just going to keep you cold," he instructed.

Ianto rolled his eyes and pulled the coat around himself and held it with one hand as he shimmied out of the clinging black cotton boxers.  He laid them on the dock to dry.

"Well, I guess we need to wait for you to dry off enough to get dressed before we go back."  Jack sat on the dock and stretched his legs out in front of him.  "Come here," he said with a slight smile.  Ianto came over and sat between his leg, leaning back on Jack's chest, Jack's coat still wrapped tightly around him.

Jack rested his chin on Ianto's shoulder.  "You've been just full of surprises lately, huh?" Jack asked.  Since Tosh and Owen's deaths Ianto seemed to feel more comfortable volunteering to take on more adventurous tasks. Jack couldn't imagine him suddenly all but skinny-dipping to retrieve a piece of reasonably harmless tech a year ago.  "What made you think that was a good idea?"

"The fact that you looked like you were about to have a melt-down over the fact that either you'd initially misread the map or that we'd have wasted most of a day coming out here, going back to get the proper kit and coming back – which still may have resulted in one of us going in the water anyway, so … best to get it over with.  I got the glove the same way."

"You wore a scuba suit to get the glove!" Jack reminded him.

"It was a lot further down."

Jack just shook his head again and kissed him behind his wet ear.  
"I never thought I'd hear myself saying this, but a little less with the heroics would be okay with me."  Jack hugged Ianto tight against him.  "Yeah, you got the cube and you're just a little chilly, but… who the hell knows what lives in there…" Jack waved a hand at the water in front of them.

"This close to the shore?  Not too much that's too scary.  We're a little far inland for sharks or whatever."  Ianto turned his face into the sun, relaxing into Jack and the heat and the let down from the adrenaline rush.

"Gwen's going to freak out when she hears about this," Jack told him.

"Yes, well, good job she wasn't here to see me then."

"Would you have done that in front of her?  Stripped down to your shorts?"

Ianto thought about it for a minute then laughed.  "Probably not.  I'd have suggested that she strip to her skivvies and go in after it."

They both laughed at that mental image and then let a comfortable silence descend.  After a few minutes Jack kissed Ianto's ear again.  "Well, I guess we'll just have to sit here on this gorgeous day, all alone except a few birds and wait for you to dry off and warm up.

Ianto turned his head back to the water so Jack couldn't see the smile on his face.  "Pity that.  Such a waste of a perfectly good day when we could be back three dozen meters underground doing paperwork and mucking weevil cells."

Jack turned Ianto's head and kissed him on his still slightly blue lips.  "Next time we'll bring a picnic."

"And swim shorts," Ianto put in and as the water in his hair dripped down onto his nose, he added, "And possibly towels as well."


End file.
